Why MobileMe Issues are Great News

Pro tip: If you have children with iPods, you are probably familiar with the look that says “I CAN’T FIND IT!!!” Mitigate that problem by creating yourself a free MobileMe account and registering each mobile device to it. When your child comes to you with those alligator tears, head over to Find My iPhone and log in. Once it locates the device, tell the iPod to display a message and to be noisy for two minutes. It will work as long as it has power and can connect to a WiFi network (even in a friends’ home or a public space). I can’t count the number of times this has happened to my son.

I’ve been having problems getting MobileMe email all day today. So have lots of other people. The problems seem to be with both IMAP servers and on accessing email on the MobileMe member page. To be fair, some of us at TUAW haven’t had any problems with MobileMe today and Apple’s MobileMe status page also mentions that only some MobileMe subscribers are experiencing problems.

The paid version of the MobileMe service has been a mixed blessing for our family over the five years we have subscribed. Having the same calendars and contacts on both our phones and on both our computers has been invaluable. However, a month ago, when our subscription expired, I chose to not renew. Apple will currently accept renewals but not new subscriptions and instead suggests that you sign up for the trial subscription.

Speculation says that Apple is creating a service to replace MobileMe called iCloud. My speculation is that all of these MobileMe issues are Apple preparing for a (dare we hope?) much more reliable and robust service that offers more features and a better value. I can hardly wait to see how Apple chooses to use their new data center in North Carolina.

Posted on May 16, 2011, in iOS. Bookmark the permalink. Comments Off on Why MobileMe Issues are Great News.